


They Shoot Heeres, Don't They?

by space_dev



Category: Be More Chill - Iconis/Tracz
Genre: Biofreeze, Bisexual Jeremy Heere, Coffee, Exhaustion, F/F, Gay Michael Mell, How Do I Tag, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, I'm Bad At Tagging, Ice Cream, Lesbian Brooke Lohst, M/M, Mentions of Cancer, Multi, Plenty of Gilmore Girls Quoting, Runner!Brooke, Sobbing, Trans Jeremy, dance marathon, lots of coffee
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-23
Updated: 2018-07-23
Packaged: 2019-06-15 01:35:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,649
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15402075
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/space_dev/pseuds/space_dev
Summary: Michael has a great idea- sign up for a dance marathon!





	They Shoot Heeres, Don't They?

**Author's Note:**

> It only says I wrote this instead of sleeping, but I also wrote this instead of showering, instead of listening to my usual writing playlist of DEH, Lindsey Stirling, and Marina & the Diamonds. No, I listened to an 80s playlist, which is why you'll see a disproportionate amount of 80s music refrenced here.
> 
> TW for entirely too much coffee, minor mention of guns, blisters, chafing, throwing up, and mentions of cancer.

"Michael, it's three in the morning," Jeremy groaned into the phone.

"I know, I know! But I discovered something that we absolutely have to do, Jer!"

"What is it?"

"There's a dance marathon at the community college in two weeks, and it benefits Faith Children's Hospital. Finally, we can be Rory and Lorelai and finally beat Kirk," Micheal said excitedly.

"That sounds cool, but did you _have_ to wake me up to tell me? Also, the correct order is Lorelai and Rory. Sounds better and makes more sense," Jeremy complained tiredly.

"Yeah, in hindsight, it could've waited. But we're doing it, right?"

"Of course, idiot."

So, the plan was set at 3:11 AM on Friday night, slightly less than two weeks before the offical start at midnight on the Friday after next.

The actual plan, they decided, would be to go to bed early Thursday night, take a nap shortly after lunch Friday afternoon (since it was still summer break) and get Starbuck's and arrive half an hour before the start. They formally signed up with the team name Team Go-Go (for Michael's love of the song Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go, which Jeremy continuously threatened to break up with him for).

The sign-up form asked you if you had any song requests to be played during the marathon, and a song to play if they won, which they would have to dance to before they could formally end their misery. Michael insisted on Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go, obviously.

The rules entailed that each team would be given ten red cards and seven yellow cards; red cards allowed them to take a hygiene-related break (application of more deodorant, bathroom break, teeth brushing, etc.) and yellow cards got them a 10-minute break, but from hour 20 onwards, they could be redeemed for a 20-minute break, but at no point was sleeping allowed. They would be dancing until there was only one team left, who would dance to their victory song before slogging off the dance floor.

The music to be played was reportedly, "A mix of slow and fast songs across multiple genres and decades, from Elvis to the Beatles to the Spice Girls to The Weeknd, plus YOUR requests!"

Teams were allowed 'crews' who could bring them outside food, coffee, and support, so long as they all payed 25 cents at entry. Crewing was not offical, technically anyone who wasn't participating was a 'spectator', but it was allowed nonetheless. Food and coffee would be available at all times, but for instance, pizza wouldn't come until 4 in the afternoon.

When told that Jeremy and Michael were participating, and all their friends (Christine, Jenna, Rich, Jake, Brooke, and Chloe) agreed to crew them, but in shifts.

The dress code was nonexistent, and Jeremy and Michael decided to go wearing light-blue t-shirts with the Tired Spongebob memes printed on the front them and 'Team Go-Go' and the wearer's name on the back, and basketball shorts. The shirts were thanks to Rich's mom, who was apparently a screenprinter. She was the one who'd suggested light blue rather than the white they'd originally decided on, so that they wouldn't turn clear with sweat, and they'd blend in a bit with the meme's background. Jeremy and Michael agreed, and the shirts were ready on the Tuesday before.

On Wednesday, with the help of Christine and less so everyone else, they compiled a list of foods they'd likely want during the marathon, including a cherry 7/11 slushie for Michael, claiming it was the superior slushie, a blue raspberry slushie for Jeremy, who strongly dissented Michael's claim, sour patch kids, Swedish fish, chocolate and salted caramel Gu packs by recommendation of Brooke, who ran frequently and was on the track team, among other things.

Thursday arrived, and Jeremy called Michael at 7 in the morning in a panic.

"What about my binder? Can I even wear a binder that long?" He asked feverishly, not even giving Michael a chance to greet him.

"Relax, Jer. You should probably wear a sports bra, and at some point you should not wear a bra at all to give your chest a chance to relax, but you'll be fine."

"No binder at all?"

"We'll ask Brooke to see if she can find you a high-compression sports bra on the short notice."

Brooke had several suggestions for him, and took Jeremy to Target to try on some that she had and pronounced 'fairly compressing, I mean, I have C cups, but I might as well have had A cups with this on.'

Jeremy found one that made his B cup chest look almost flat with the purposefully slightly large meme shirt, purchased it, and promptly relaxed.

Friday rolled around, and Jeremy fell asleep right after lunch and woke around 6 to the smell of spaghetti. He ate dinner with his dad, took a shower, put on a little more antiperspirant than usual, got dressed, and Michael picked him up at 9, Mr. Heere promising to come to the college around 5 in the morning before he headed to work with coffee, and come afterward work for a bit as well.

  
They spent an hour and a half in Starbucks with Christine, Jenna, and Rich (Jake, Chloe, and Jake were going to meet them at the college and watch them start then leave after awhile to sleep like sane people while Christine and Jenna helped them out until they undoubtedly fell asleep on the bleachers) before heading to the college and arriving at about 11.

They signed in (the girl signing them in said that she, too, hated Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go with a passion) and they sat in the bleachers until the DJ, Wendy Lauckmire, a sophomore at the college, wearing a white-on-red polka dotted dress and matching bright red flats, called them down to the dance floor (the basketball court for the Middleborough Mammoths) and after a bunch of speeches, pushed all 64 teams back into the balloon and pool noodle decorated hallway, aptly called 'The Tunnel' and a 30-second countdown to midnight and the start began.

"They should do this on New Year's Eve," someone commented.

"You ready, babe?" Michael asked, turning to Jeremy, who had his eyes hyper-focused on the back of a pink shirt that the girl in front of them was wearing, along with a matching black poodle skirt.

Jeremy nodded feverishly, not taking his eyes off the girl's back.

Michael was about to make a crack at Jeremy's focus on the girl's back when Wendy's tone became louder from the gym.

"4, 3, 2... 1! Go, go, go!!" Wendy screeched enthusiastically, and Michael and Jeremy were nearly trampled as everyone ran out onto the dance floor and immediately started dancing as Footloose began blasting from the sound system.

The first three hours were a flurry of equally dizzying fast and slow dancing, bright lights, and the buzz of caffeine until the Starbucks coffee wore off around 3 AM.

Christine dropped off about 3:45, and Jenna soon followed, but it was alright. Michael and Jeremy had only used one card, a red one, at 2:30, to get rid of the coffee that now resided in their bladders.

"You doing okay, Jeremy?" Michael asked around 4:30 in the morning.

No, Jeremy was jittery from the caffeine still left in his system, he was slightly tired, and he wanted nothing more than to curl up next to Jenna and fall asleep.

"I'm fine, just jittery."

"Lemme know when you need to take a yellow break, okay? Rather not have you pass out on the gymnasium floor."

"It's still early," Jeremy said indignantly. "Besides, I want to save at least two for twenty-minute breaks near the end."

"If you last that long."

"Shut up, you dick."

Michael laughed and playfully flipped Jeremy off in response.

Even though it was only 4:30, 29 teams had already dropped out, leaving just 35 left. Wendy hadn't begun playing requests yet, saying that she was saving them to make sure that the team that had requested the songs stayed around.

The food table was set up at 5:15, with sandwiches of various kinds, crappy coffee, and fruits. People were allowed to dance over and keep dancing as they ate.

So Jeremy and Michael danced over to the sounds of Exposè and each got a styrofoam cup of coffee, Jeremy got a grapefruit half, Michael a tuna sandwich.

Some time after Wendy had announced that there were 28 teams still there at the offical 6 hour mark and promptly played Team Queen's request (Bohemian Rhapsody, which was interesting to dance to), I Wanna Dance With Somebody came on, with the announcement that it was the first of four of Team Go-Go's requests. The coffee had kicked in by this point

"I thought we only did three requests, Jeremy," Michael said, though grinning all the while.

"I put in a fourth one when your back was turned," Jeremy said with an equally bright smile as he was whooshed around to the beat with new energy.

"Oh, did you?"

"Yeah. You'll love it, trust me. But I added a note, it's not gonna get played until sometime in the afternoon."

"Rude," Michael joked.

"That's to motivate you not to give up at least until the song is played, since you'll never be told what the song is if you don't stick around."

"That's cold, Emily."

"I do always wonder what she got Lorelai for her wedding."

"It seems like they must've hinted at it at some point or subtly said something, no way the writers neglected to do _anything_ about it."

"I don't know. We'll have to have a clue-hunting Gilmore Girls marathon with the gang after we win this thing."

"Do not ever call our friends 'the gang' again and you'll live to do so, dear Rory."

"Oh, so I'm Rory now? I thought she was your favourite."

Jeremy stuck out his tongue. "She is my favourite, but you're the one acting childish right now," he said.

"Oh, is that so?" Michael asked, and before Jeremy could respond, he quickly whirled the shorter boy around once, twice, thrice before relenting.

"You dick," Jeremy said indignantly, a bit out of breath.

Michael laughed. "You're the one not telling me what the song is."

Mr. Heere came with much better coffee than the crappy stuff the pair had been inhaling, and Jenna woke up shortly after his arrival. They had a brief conversation from the sidelines with Michael and Jeremy as they greatfully sipped their Peppermint Mocha Frappès from the godsend that was Starbucks (and Mr. Heere), and they decided that they'd take a break to change their clothes when Brooke and Chloe got there, which would be around 8.

  
Mr. Heere left around 20 minutes later, and Brooke and Chloe showed up for Wendy's jubilant announcement of the eight hour mark. Christine, who'd awoken around 7, had had a forty-minute conversation with Wendy, and the dancing pair were sure that there would be showtunes involved. Sure enough, after Team Redbird's request, Walk Like An Egyptian, which the remaining 26 teams somewhat enthusiastically danced to, Candy Store came on.

Someone had brought a couple KFC buckets of fried chicken and deposited them on the food table, and Michael happened to find a chicken gun during the song and point it at the lady running the food table, coincidentally named Lane Park (she'd apparently only volunteered for the 8:00-1:00 shift because of her name and Gilmore Girls love), pointed it at her, and shouted, "Get off the fence, get off the damn fence," to her delighted amusement, as well as Jeremy's.

  
Brooke caught a whiff of the boys as they whirled by and the girls realised that they'd yet to change clothes like they'd promised, and she shouted to them to hold up a red card and try to eliminate the stench.

Michael put on a rainbow tank top and Jeremy put on a t-shirt with the bisexual colours for the current theme, pride (Wendy assigned a new theme every three hours to try and promote clothes changing and therefore B.O. elimination, but the two had ignored it until now) but they put on matching Pac-Man shorts that Christine had found in a Walmart in suburban Newark when she went to see Wicked in New York City with her mom and cousin a couple months ago and couldn't them pass up.

They looked stupid and it didn't really match, but it was fine.

As they walked back up to the dance floor, Chloe ran up and handed them each a pinwheel hat but with pride flags instead of pinwheels on top. Michael got the rainbow one, Jeremy got the trans one.

The next couple of hours, the two slowed down considerably and even the wonderful Gu shots quit being at all effective, and Jeremy rested his head on Michael's shoulder as they slow-danced to Janet Jackson.

"Cmon, Jer, you can't give up now, there's only 24 teams left," Michael said, lightly kissing the shorter boy's nose comfortingly.

"I feel like I'm going to throw up," Jeremy mumbled, and thus, Michael hastily held up a red card and hurried him to the bathroom, where he made one of those large burps that feel like theyre going to be upchuck but luckily aren't.

"You feel better?" Michael said, rubbing mindless patterns into his back.

"Much."

They spent the rest of their break re-applying deodorant and antiperspirant, and then went back out.

About an hour later, when the giant digital clock on the big projection screen behind Wendy read 2:34, an instrumental Irish song came on, and a black girl with a shock of curly purple hair and wearing a dress that looked an awful lot like Rory's dance marathon dress, began Irish step dancing to the beat. Her girlfriend, an Asian girl with an undercut and a Lorelai-looking dress joined her, but it was clear that the black girl was an actual Irish step dancer, and her girlfriend was not.

So the Asian girl danced over to Michael and Jeremy, the nearest team, grabbed Michael's arm, and Jeremy protectively latched onto Michael's other arm.

The girl danced them over to her partner and instructed them to dance a circle around her with her, which they did, Jeremy a bit awkwardly, and a couple others joined in the circle as the girl stomped both groggily and fast-paced to the beat.

None of them were working on all cylinders, but it was great, delirious, giggly fun, and Wendy actually played a second song after the first, a song actually created for Irish step dancers to dance to, as half the remaining teams danced a giggly circle around her. It wasn't exactly the dance scene in Tangled, but it was fun nonetheless, plus some of the professional photographers and the team from News Channel 17 focused their cameras and commentary on them.

When the song ended, the original couple talked with Jeremy and Michael as they danced regularly. The Irish step dancer was Zare, the Asian girl Delilah, and Delilah's younger sister had cancer and was in Faith Children's Hospital, and that's why they were participating.

  
"We have a bunch of sponsors that donate for every hour we're still on the dance floor," Delilah said, whirling Zare around as she spoke. "Plus, every hour over 18, they'll donate a shut ton more. Half of the money's going to Lily, the other half the hospital in general. That's also why we're called Team Lily."

"That's really cool!" Michael answered enthusiastically.

"Yeah, plus, the donation jars scattered around the gym have been emptied nine times. They're making a ton of money for all the kids, Lily included," Zare added.

"Is Lily going to come here to watch you guys later?" Jeremy asked.

"I think my parents are gonna bring her, with some McDonalds too, I believe. I was promised a cheeseburger for 5:00," Delilah answered. "Zare's mom is up in the stands, monitoring the money from the sponsors and some other donors too. The one with the MacBook." She began waving.

Indeed, up in the bleachers, was a woman with cornrows who waved back at Delilah and yelled something about changing clothes. Zare made a face and held up a red card. "Good luck, you two," she said, before the two hurried off the dance floor towards the bathroom.

Michael's moms showed up around 3, toting a bag of Moe's takeout, which Michael and Jeremy ate hungrily as they groggily danced to the sounds of Rachel Platten.

"It's like, being jet-lagged, but, like, ten times worse," Jeremy complained between bites.

Mr. Heere came again, with more Starbucks, at 3:30, while Michael and Jeremy were still polishing off their chips, but they gratefully accepted the purposefully caffeine-heavy drinks.

"Just 12 teams left as we enter into the sixteenth hour of the marathon! The theme until eighteen hours is Fan Convention- dress like Jedi, Gilmore Girls, Broadway characters- it doesn't matter, as long as you're still having fun! Remember to make a donation in one of the ten jars located around the gym or through our website, Faith Children's Hospital Dance Marathon dot com! And now, here's a request from Team Go-Go, Bad Idea from Waitress the Musical!"

"That's what you requested, huh?" Michael asked, not noticing four phones trained on him and Jeremy as he whirled the pale boy around.

"Yup."

But about a minute in, the track abruptly switched, and Michael nearly stopped moving in surprise when he realised what was going on.

"You fucking rick-rolled me, asshole!" Michael gasped as Jeremy nearly bent over from laughter, both from Michael's expression and his sudden outburst. "Wait, is it rick-rolling if it's not the video?"

"Look at the fucking projection screen, Mell."

And indeed, the Never Gonna Give You Up video was playing on the screen where the clock had previously been displayed, and the News Channel 6 team (News Channel 17 had left) had its camera trained on the screen.

Sure, it hadn't been played from a link, making it technically not rick-rolling, but it was clever and devious all the same.

Plus, Christine, Brooke, Chloe, Jenna, Mr. Heere and Michael's moms, plus the newly-arrived Rich and Jake, all had their phones either trained on the screen or the dancing boys.

"That was epic!" Delilah shrieked at Jeremy as she and Zare whirled by, barely giving the two a chance to register that they were there until they had already gone by. Their Gilmore Girls dresses had been discarded in favour of green Bermuda shorts and t-shirts with the picture of a young girl on the front and 'Team Lily' on the back, with blue New Balance sneakers.

When the song ended, Michael and Jeremy held up another red card and changed again, this time, back into their fresh, clean meme shirts and basketball shorts, courtesy of Jake, applied antiperspirant and deodorant, and Brooke expertly dealt with a blister on Michael's heel, applied Vaseline to a spot where Jeremy had been chafed by his shirt, and gave both boys a quick foot massage with some cold green slime called Biofreeze, that would apparently numb their feet.

"Several times, I've almost dropped out of long-distance races from painful feet, this stuff's saved me every single time. It's magic. And now that I've applied this with my bare hands, they'll be numb for a couple hours too. You're welcome."

They hurried back out onto the dance floor with just moments to spare, and witnessed one of the girls from Team Revolution basically collapse, and the on-sight paramedics quickly getting her off the dance floor and onto a cot on the side where they began helping her out. Her teammate came with and watched anxiously.

Wendy quickly switched to a fast-pasted Sia song to distract the dancers, and announced that Team Revolution would be dropping out because Josephine Lauren's collapse, reportedly from dehydration and exhaustion. Josephine and her teammate, Alexandra, would be given a persistence award later on.

"I know that Josephine just collapsed, and I feel sorry for her and I should be sad for a couple minutes, but Michael, my feet feel all tingly and cold and weird, and at the same time I can barely feel them, holy shit," Jeremy said.

"Mine too. It feels oddly good, though. We'll have to snag some of this stuff from Brooke afterwards, whatever it is is great."

"Agreed."

Now that they were down to 10 teams (Team Vulcan dropped out after a grumpy and tired Team Anison flipped off their Vulcan salutes after Jason whirled Annika around in the air for a couple of seconds and the pair were sweating like irrigation systems in their Star Trek cosplays anyway), people started swooping by, trash-talking them, trying to get them to back down to lessen the competition, and subsequently, the amount of time they'd have to remain standing.

Nobody relented to the trash talking, which was mostly being done by Team Anison, Team Frankfart, and Team MinionHateClub0016 (someone had apparently forgotten that this was an IRL event and that the previous 15 Team MinionHateClub00's would not be present)

But eventually, they relented, seeing as it was now 6 PM and the remaining couples were mostly slowly swaying, regardless of the music that was playing, trying to stay awake and mostly failing. It didn't help that the coffee that was previously on the food table had been revoked, and that their 'crew' refused to get them more coffee, saying that they'd need to tough it out until the end.

"Can I be Rory now?" Jeremy mumbled, putting his head onto Michael's chest and wrapping his arms around Michael's middle so as not to fall over quite so quickly if he fell asleep.

"Babe, no, cmon, we've still got 10 teams to beat," Michael chastised, trying to pull the smaller boy up into a standing position on his own.

"They haven't even played our second request yet. I just wanna go to sleep." 

  
"Which one? You've already rick-rolled me, that awful Whitney song that I like that I can't remember the name of played, and... oh, I guess that does leave one more, but I can't remember what it was for the life of me."

"Me neither."

The Cyndi Lauper song playing annoyingly from the relentless sound system faded out, and a song with vocals that sounded fairly Beatles-like, but neither of the boys could be sure in that moment.

But Jeremy, it seems, was awake enough to listen to the lyrics, and he made commentary. "Is it just me, or does this song sound like something out of a trippy horror movie? Or were they just high when they wrote it?"

"Agreed. They were probably high. I think this is the Beatles, a lot of their music from this era is kind of about getting high, or written when high," Michael responded.

"Nerd," Jeremy mumbled.

The music faded into the background a bit and it seemed that Wendy had taken a break, for nobody was making commentary as Team Anison and Team Dead-Toinette simultaneously dropped out (literally; paramedics had to drag three people off the dance floor) and the table with the music laptop and an abandoned styrofoam cup of now flat Sprite was devoid of people; after taking a look around, Michael found Wendy dead asleep on the bleachers, and pointed it out to Jeremy, who hummed in response.

The hours seemed to both drag by and zoom by, and soon, Wendy had returned in a yellow cardigan and a jean skirt, plus matching bright yellow ballet flats that looked like they'd been made from a raincoat, and all in all hurt everyone's tired eyes.

"It's now 8 PM, folks, so the remaining 8 teams have been dancing for around twenty hours," she said, dramatically stretching out and emphasising 'twenty hours', before continuing, "Let's hear a round of applause for them, they probably feel miserable, half-asleep, or sleep-drunk right now. Hopefully not actually drunk, because that's a crap ton of paperwork for me and my boss later."

Applause rang out, mostly from Jeremy and Michael's support section and Team Lily's support section, which had recently expanded to include a young girl with a breathing tube up her nose and a pink bandana covering her bald head, followed by a disproportionately tall man wheeling the oxygen tank and a regular-sized woman following with a McDonald's bag and two McCafe coffees, to which Delilah shouted "Finally!" and dragged Zare over while holding up a yellow card.

She'd grabbed the cheeseburger and coffee from her mom with a quick kiss on the cheek, gently hugged Lily who pushed her away after a moment with a "You stink like hell, Delilah," flopped down on the bleachers with Zare, who had a Fillet O Fish, and began inhaling her burger.

One guy, from Team 626, wearing a Stitch shirt and running leggings, shouted something about wishing he was drunk, and everyone laughed, despite around 20 people not fully comprehending the joke, i.e. the dancers.

Jeremy was basically asleep on Michael's chest, who would've been equally tired if not for an insistent pull on his bladder. "Jer, I really need to pee."

"No-o, you're warm," Jeremy groaned, not moving from his position but still swaying slowly to Bon Jovi.

Michael shouted across the gym over the sounds of Weird Al for Brooke to come over, which she did.

"I need to pee. Put those fancy runner's feet of yours to work and don't let Jeremy stop moving. I'll be back in a minute," Michael said, pulling Jeremy off of him and helping him latch onto Brooke, who swayed to the music.

"I'm getting a strange sense of dèjá vu right now. Could it be... god, they shoot Heeres, don't they?" Brooke commented.

"Go jump off a microwave. You're warm," Jeremy slurred, not moving much, but moving a tiny bit on his skinny-ass legs, just enough to keep him from getting disqualified like the girl from Team Rodriguez did.

"You're cute when you're sleep drunk. If I weren't gay, I would totally date you again. While Michael's got the card up, you wanna go pee?"

"No."

"Well, fine then. As far as I know, you guys only have a couple red cards left, so don't say I didn't warn you when you're about to wet your pants on the basketball court."

"Go jump off a microwave. Or better yet, a bathroom."

"But I thought I was warm," Brooke teased, moving away from him ever so slightly, enough so that they were no longer quite touching, but not far enough that Jeremy would fall over. He did stumble, as it was.

"Brooooke," he whined, oblivious to the fact that Christine was recording their exchange from the bleachers to use as blackmail later.

"You can have this heater back if you dance with me. It'll warm you right up, anyway," Brooke said, beginning to dance a little to the song currently playing, Someone's Watching Me, and swinging Jeremy's arms around and beginning to softly sing as she whirled him around in a circle, and even shrieked the "I wonder who's watching me now, the I.R.S.?!" line in order to jolt Jeremy awake.

I mean, it kind of worked, and Jeremy resigned himself to his fate, cooperating with Brooke and actually moving his feet a little bit.

"Now you've got it!" Brooke said encouragingly, whirling him under her arm in a circle as We Didn't Start The Fire faded in, replacing Rockwell. Jeremy even sang a little bit with Brooke.

The two looked odd, Brooke in her blue leggings, sweatshirt tied around her waist, Nike's on her feet, blue Hillary baseball cap, grey tank top with the pink lesbian flag on the front, open sides exposing her black-and-orange tiger striped sports bra, Jeremy in his wrinkled meme shirt and basketball shorts, skinny, pale sticks that barely passed as legs holding him up as they danced slowly to Billy Joel.

When Michael came back out, he was surprised to see that his boyfriend was still, y'know, actually conscious, and Jeremy insisted he finish the song with Brooke before clinging to Michael and beginning his barely-moving swaying thing he'd been doing before to an admittedly slow song, Total Eclipse Of The Heart. Wendy had forgotten to announce a theme when she announced the 20-hour mark, but it was quite obvious that it was currently The 80s.

Yes, their second request did play, but Jeremy at that point was far, far too tired to care that Love On Top was blasting from, the speakers, and Michael, being nearly as tired, didn't care much either.

  
Teams began to drop out slowly, Team MinionHateClub0016's girl nearly fell asleep on her boyfriend and he pulled them out, Team Taylor Swift Kick To The Face and Team Please Hold The Fuck Up (So basically, all the teams with clever names) both dropped out, and then Team Cathrine The... Wait. (This one wasn't particularly funny at all, oops.)

Pretty soon, it was 11:48 PM, and it was down to Team Lily, Team Go-Go, and Team FemSlash, who dropped out when one of the girls tripped and nearly broke her ankle.

"Wake up from those power naps, folks, 'cause we're down to two teams, and it's almost midnight!" Wendy screeched as Team FemSlash slogged off the dance floor. "Team Lily and Team Go-Go! Both have done as well as can be expected, Team Lily's Delilah Pak got that cheeseburger she'd been craving a couple hours ago, Team Go-Go's Jeremy Heere woke up for two songs, plus many other memorable moments from both pairs all day. Let's get those bodies moving and see who's got the caffeine and drive to win!"

With that, Wendy pounded a key on her MacBook, and none other than Wham! themselves began playing, the song? None other than Team Go-Go's theme song, Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go.

"This competition isn't so much about winning, more about raising money for the wonderful Faith Children's Hospital, helping kids with serious illnesses since 1973, like Lily Kishimoto, the little sister of Delilah Kishimoto of Team Lily, currently battling leukaemia with the help of her family and friends. ," Wendy announced, momentarily pausing the hellish sounds of Wham! "She's in the bleachers with us tonight, and already, the Kishimoto family has made over six thousand dollars for Lily through Team Lily. Please, if you haven't already, consider donating, whether it's directly to the Kishimotos, or in one of our donation jars in the gymnasium. Since it's not entirely about winning, we'll be playing the team's victory songs and any requests that we haven't yet played."

And then Wham! fades back into existence, and Jeremy and Michael dance a little bit, but it's mostly just swaying slowly, Jeremy's head buried in Michael's chest, and it's pretty much the same for Delilah and Zare.

It's during Team Lily's theme song, Reflection (apparently, it was Lily's favourite song, and Mulan was her favourite princess) that Michael realised that Jeremy was silently crying into his shirt.

"Hey, hey, what's wrong, Jeremy?" Michael asked gently.

"I want to go to sleep so bad, my feet hurt, I want ice cream and I want another Bio Slime thing... whatever it's called... I want another Bio foot massage, and I'm so tired."

Michael chuckled a bit. "You're absolutely adorable. What kind of ice cream do you want?"

"Mint chip," Jeremy mumbled, pressing his face into Michael's shirt even more.

Team Lily swayed over. "If he wants ice cream, my mom brought a cooler with some ice cream and water and ice and stuff, and I think she's got mint chip. After we're all done, he can have as much as he wants," Zare offered.

"Really?" Jeremy all but sobbed, momentarily stopping his campaign to drown himself in his boyfriend's shirt to look at Zare.

Zare laughed. "Yeah. You guys are cool."

Wendy started shrieking about how it was 11:59, acting like it was 59 seconds until 2100 began, rather than 59 seconds until Saturday, June 19th, 2018, began, and a couple people in the stands joined in her countdown.

When it offically hit midnight, after Wendy's short speech about how Team Lily and Team Go-Go had been on their feet for 24 hours, Michael turned to Jeremy. "You wanna stop?" He asked.

Jeremy nodded. "I want more green slimy stuff and ice cream," he sobbed.

Michael yelled to Wendy that they were stopping, and the poor girl went pretty much ballistic, and made Michael and Jeremy stand a little longer while she gave them medals and a trophy, plus Team Lily's giant-ass trophy and similar medals, before they were allowed to slog off the basketball court.

At some point, the Kishimotos and the Robertsons had invited Michael and Jeremy's crew to sit with them, and after Zare got the pint of mint chip and a real spoon, not plastic, from her mom, Jeremy sat on the bleachers flanked by his dad and Michael, sobbing as Brooke gave him the best Biofreeze foot massage he'd ever gotten. True, it was only his second one, but it was amazing.

At some point, he'd finished the pint and fallen asleep on his dad, and both teams exchanged Facebook and Twitter handles (well, Michael kind of stole Jeremy's phone to do it for him, but meh, it was necessary) and exchanged goodbyes.

Michael gently woke Jeremy, and helped him slog to his dad's car, so he was distracted when his Nanay swiped his keys, but it didn't matter, because Michael just defeatedly laid out in the backseat, kicked off his shoes, and slept all the way home.

{3:06 AM} player_002 _: mikey look what i found_

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> \- Writing this was probably the most fun I've ever had. I was fucking jamming along to that 80s playlist, actually putting down words was effortless, and... yeah. I've got to go to an orthodontist appointment today, so my words will probably be less fun later on.:,)
> 
> \- They Shoot Gilmores, Don't They? Is hands down the best Gilmore Girls episode. I will fight you on this.
> 
> \- The lesbian Lams (if you caught it) was inspired by the WONDERFUL fic, Haircuts, by Bubbly_Kandy, which you can find here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11177148/chapters/24952653
> 
> \- Guys, Biofreeze is the SHIT. As a former runner, and my mom being both a current runner and a race director, I can attest to how amazing the stuff is. Same with Gu shots and Vaseline.
> 
> \- This is the longest one-shot I've ever done, and I'm really proud of it.


End file.
